mr trouble!

this is one short story i wrote sometime ago, hope somebody enjoys it!

MR TROUBLE

Trouble often times wears a shirt and trousers. It wears a beard. I know this because I have seen the guy. Pause; let me tell you all about it.

Upon leaving Dolapo’s house [where I had received some serious thrashing at chess] last Sunday; I took a taxi to challenge where I then boarded another taxi to Tanke. I was going to visit mama at the hospital.

While in the car waiting for the last passenger, I made the acquaintance of a particularly black skinned, yellow eyed man who was a die- hard fan of Wole Soyinka. And then came the last passenger; a petite beautiful lady with one big ‘Ghana must go’ bag.

The driver immediately told her that her load would cost her an extra hundred naira.

That was when I fell into the bloody, yet carefully crafted trap that the devil himself must have set for me. I decided to play knight in shining armour.

‘That is unfair!’ I shouted at the driver, ‘outrageous!’

‘Oga, Na so we dey carry am o!’ He shouted back at me. [Meaning; that is how much we charge]

‘Why? Why? Why do you people have no human feelings at all, must you cheat every time you have the opportunity to?’ I shouted at him again.

We kept exchanging hot words until I finally kept quiet at the urging of other passengers. My shouting was all for nothing, the driver did not bulge; she was still going to pay a hundred Naira extra. The lady agreed, got into the car and we got moving.

When she got to Tybet square, the petite lady alighted from the car and began to remove money from her purse to give the driver; I immediately stopped her assuring her that I would pay. The beautiful lady flashed me a lovely smile and said ‘thank you’ as she took her bag and vanished into the crowd. Then we got to my own destination; Jaga hospital and I alighted. I was going to pay for both the lady and myself. I put my hand in my pocket to remove my wallet, it wasn’t there. I calmly looked in the car, it was not there. The situation took just a moment to register.

I looked into the driver’s contemptuous eyes and knew I was looking at personified trouble. I began to tremble...